It’s Rooney Mara, the girl who beat everyone to become The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. In Stockholm yesterday preparing for the role. She’s supposed to speak with a Swedish accent. So I guess she’s starting to practise.

I can see it a little, I guess, in her face – that wounded animal expression about her, a reticence in her eyes, the look of a forever child. But Lisbeth’s vulnerability was well hidden, not only by her physical embellishments – the tats, the piercings, the dark makeup – but also in her attitude: this Lisbeth has yet to grow into the kind of fierce aggression that can only come from years and years of scar tissue reopened over and over again.

I saw faces like these every day working at Covenant House Vancouver. Most people think street kids are just lazy and don’t want to do chores. Most street kids are running from abuse – when they come at you with their squeegees on the street corner looking smug and punky, it’s not because they’re genuinely smug and punky, it’s because that’s the kind of armour they need to stay alive.

This is part of the reason Lisbeth’s story resonates on so many levels with so many people. It’s a compelling narrative, sure, but she’s really just a street kid who like so many other street kids got f-cked over by the people who were supposed to protect her.

Noomi Rapace played this very convincingly. Can Rooney Mara?

Also attached – Noomi in Venice for the premiere of Raavanan.

Click here to catch up on the Covenant House Vancouver blog for real life stories from our youth. Right now, we are in need of jeans as the weather is turning and our kids are inadequately dressed for the wet and the chill.


Photos from Wenn.com and Splashnewsonline.com